Pedal power shifts to a higher gear

Cycling has become the corporate world’s latest hot activity: thousands of time-poor, body-conscious white-collar workers are saving petrol and building muscle by using high-end bikes to get to and from the office.

Flight Centre founder
Graham Turner
owns seven bikes: five in Australia and two in London. He has spent about $20,000 over the past 20 years on a mix of makes, accessories and gadgets, and cycles at least five hours a week.

“I used to run a bit and did a few marathons but I got sore knees and so took up cycling as a way to get fit," says Turner, who is in his 60s. “To get a decent road bike or mountain bike it’ll cost around $5000, then there’s accessories, but considering what you get out of it it’s not ridiculously expensive."

Salmat chief executive
Grant Harrod
, another cycling tragic, owns three bikes: a racer, a mountain bike and his first pedal-powered ride, which he says is a “sentimental favourite".

He estimates he has spent more than $20,000 on bikes since he took up the sport, and doesn’t regret a cent.

“A lot of senior executives are inherently competitive and I guess a bit of it could be living out the sporting careers we never had," Harrod says from high in the French Alps, where he has been following the Tour de France by bike. (The famous race finishes on Sunday. Its owners, France’s Amaury family and Lagardère, which also owns Elle magazine, received €137 million in dividends from the race between 2004 and 2008, according to Bloomberg).

Harrod says cycling allows him to network with other corporate enthusiasts and, unlike golf, is untainted by elitism.

“It’s a real community," he says. “It’s ageless, and completely non-status. It doesn’t matter what your status is. Once you put the lycra on, everyone’s the same."

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Cities across the country are struggling to keep pace with the infrastructure needed to support the explosion in bike commuting.

The Victorian government last year announced $115 million to improve cycle facilities. The City of Sydney’s 2030 plan has allocated $70 million in a four-year period to infrastructure and aims for 10 per cent of all CBD trips to be by bike by 2016.

Bicycle Queensland, meanwhile, has recorded a 20 per cent increase in annual membership. The $556 million South East Queensland Principal Cycle Network plan aims for 5 per cent of residents to be riding by 2011.

Brisbane City Council has built 150 dedicated bike parking stations across the city from where public bikes can be rented for $55 a year, $25 a quarter, or $10 a day.

Sales at bike shops around the country are booming. City Bike Depot, in the heart of the Sydney CBD, has reported a 30 per cent rise in sales over the past year.

“A lot of blokes are going all out and we’ve had quite a few sales in the $15,000 range," deputy manager Adam MacBeth says.

“That will get you a high-end Italian-made road bike, with top-of-the-line groove set, full race kit jersey bib shorts, a really nice lightweight pair of shoes and a computer and carbon bottle case."

Cycling culture is infiltrating the workplace. At Spackman Mossop and Michaels, an urban design firm in Sydney, more than 70 per cent of employees cycle to work as a result of financial incentives from management.

Director Michael Spackman says a one-off payment of up to $2500 is built into every salary package to make it easier for staff to get on their bikes. Extra money is available for staff who “catch the cycling bug".

“If there’s a major event on that people want to go in it, we will pay their entry fees, pay for their jersey or they can get time off for training," Spackman says.

A staff stacked with cyclists has a higher than average rate of commuting crashes. “I’ve been knocked off a lot of times and there have been one or two incidents with staff," Spackman says. “Unfortunately that happens but we’ve been lucky that nothing has been serious."

Globally, bicycle production has been booming.

About 94 million bikes were made each year from 1990 to 2002. The figure climbed to 130 million in 2007, outstripping the 70 million motor vehicles produced, according to the Earth Policy Institute, a US-based environmental think tank.

Most of the demand comes from China, home to more than half the world’s bikes. Many European and American cities, including London, Ottawa and New York, are trying to increase bike use by installing parking lots and paths. They are all hoping to reach riding levels in Copenhagen, where more than 30 per cent of commuters make the trip to work on two wheels.

John Forster, of Griffith University’s department of economics, doubts many Australians will end up cycling to work.

“Some things are being done like Brisbane’s new bikeways, but I doubt if that’s going to have much impact," he says. “People are really attached to their automobiles and find it hard to switch to public transport or bikes." He says “our cities are just too spread out".

Ewen McMurchy disagrees. The 19-year-old university student has spent about $10,000 on his fleet of cycles comprising a road bike, two fixed-gear bikes and one single-speed bike. Travelling 30 minutes across Sydney each morning to work, he says he chose to invest in a bike rather than a car because pedal power is cheaper, faster, and “a whole lot more fun".

“Exercise is a big plus as is the speed of getting around," he says. “It really is quicker than any other mode of transport in peak hour without a doubt."